


For the Long Term

by iksnilits



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Memory Loss, Old Age
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-19
Updated: 2013-07-19
Packaged: 2017-12-20 17:20:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/889839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iksnilits/pseuds/iksnilits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Come, run away with me. We’ll get in the car, just you and me; we’ll go and we won’t come back until we’ve done something crazy—let’s get married, I’ll propose to you right now, look, I’ve already got the flowers—“ </p>
<p>And indeed he did, a silky bunch of color from his garden, arranged in his gnarled old hands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For the Long Term

**Author's Note:**

> I saw [this post](http://invisiblink.tumblr.com/post/52927972303/hula-hope-my-grandpa-has-alzheimers-so-he-has) on Tumblr and I couldn't stop thinking about it.  
> This is super short and really rough, sorry!

Dean probably could have told you that Sam would end up an unnaturally fit and bronzed old man, the sort that did hot yoga at five in the morning before sipping a flaxseed-and-kale smoothie and running with his dogs. 

He probably couldn’t have told you that Cas would spend obscene amounts of time in his overgrown garden, fertilizing everything and leaning on the sagging fence to tell stories to the neighbor-children, who were appropriately enthralled by his outlandish (yet factual) historical tales. 

Dean definitely could not have predicted that he’d be the one to bring Cas breakfast tea in the mornings because he was an ornery old goat before caffeine, the one to rub Cas’ sore joints after too much weeding, and the one on the receiving end of Cas’ gentle, sleepy smiles. 

“You’re so _wonderfully_ in love,” said Harriet, Sam’s lady-friend, who gave them certificates for free Pilates lessons at her studio and knitted them mittens. 

Dean would have made some smart-ass remark, but Cas was squeezing his hand and leaning into him with all his weight in that obnoxiously endearing way of his. Sam just cackled, grinning at Harriet and re-tying his little gray ponytail. 

Cas and Dean were closing in on 80—Sam was slightly younger, and enjoyed rubbing that in their faces, as if four years was closer to the equivalent of a decade. Their bodies weren’t young anymore. Sex was creaky and infrequent because it was quite the exciting occurrence when they managed to get it up at the same time—but all the same, Dean thought he could be okay with that as long as he still got cuddles. 

It wasn’t a huge surprise when Cas started forgetting things. At first, it was just absentmindedness: where he’d left his pallet of flowers to be planted, when he’d put the bread in the oven, but one evening, he forgot who Harriet was, and that’s when Dean started to worry. 

He didn’t think Cas would forget him. No matter how bad it got, no matter what Cas forgot; Dean thought, selfishly, that he was too important. 

Cas broke his heart one Sunday morning, the sun pooling in their bedsheets and catching in Cas’ shocks of salt-and-pepper hair, when he rolled over to face Dean and said, not unkindly, “What are you doing in my bed?”

Dean fled, made their coffee with shaking hands and fought the urge to vomit into the cold steel of the sink. Cas came downstairs some time later, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and pressed a good-morning kiss to Dean’s cheek, one of many thousands.

\---

Cas was wrist-deep in his garden, sweating in the afternoon sunshine. Dean leaned on the ladder.

“Hey, Cas.”

Cas looked up, nodded a greeting, and assessed Dean. 

“You remind me of a man I loved—of course, you’re quite a bit older. But then again, so am I.” Cas leaned in, peering at Dean. “It’s your eyes. My boy had the same autumn eyes as you. And the freckles, oh, how I would tease him in the summertime.”

Cas sat back on his heels and held up a wilted snap-pea flower to Dean, his fingers gritty with dirt. 

“Come on, let’s run away together. Let’s get out of here, go somewhere wild.”

“Cas—Cas, what—“ Dean’s throat was coated with the same soil that caked Cas’ hands and the grass was blurry and swimming in front of him and he scrubbed his hand across his eyes. When he looked back, Cas was turned, tending to his beans and waiting expectantly for an answer. Dean couldn’t give him one.

\---

Another morning:

“Come, run away with me. We’ll get in the car, just you and me; we’ll go and we won’t come back until we’ve done something crazy—let’s get married, I’ll propose to you right now, look, I’ve already got the flowers—“ 

And indeed he did, a silky bunch of color from his garden, arranged in his gnarled old hands. 

Dean sat heavily in the porch swing, patted the space next to him. Cas sat. 

“I’ll run away with you. Where will we go, Cas?”


End file.
